


To Kill A King

by Clo



Category: The Song of the Lioness - Tamora Pierce
Genre: M/M, Off-screen Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-16
Updated: 2015-07-16
Packaged: 2018-04-09 15:42:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4354736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clo/pseuds/Clo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An early morning summons to Jonathan’s room could spell ruin for Roger’s plan. </p>
<p>Brief what-we-didn’t-see-on-the-page discussion between Roger and Jonathan, set toward the end of Lioness Rampant before Alanna comes back. I always wondered how Roger knew to wait for Alanna on the palace walls, when the way he questions Thom makes it clear his spies aren’t worth their weight in mud. Someone must have told him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Kill A King

**Author's Note:**

> I think we miss a lot of the interesting stuff about Roger during LR and it bugs me, because I’d rather see some of Roger’s story – and degenerating sanity, despite being able to orchestrate and nearly pull off a plot to destroy the kingdom which begs questions about everyone else’s sanity really, that they let a certifiably crazy person even get that close to winning – than just Alanna getting stuck up a mountain. The pairing, well, it's all-but-canon and there has to be some reason why Thom holds back from trying to discover what Roger is clearly up to. Then again, insanity does run in his family. 
> 
> My defence for the thought of Roger/Jonathan is that it could totally have happened, if you squint sideways and cross your fingers. Even Alanna says “I know you love him” in Hands of the Goddess.
> 
> You may recognise the discussion they have from one of the strategy groups in Squire, though naturally pre-Daine they draw different conclusions.
> 
> This was originally posted a long while back (2009) on Insanejournal. The title was borrowed from the Hungry Lucy song of the same.

* * *

 

When Roger is shown into Jonathan’s private study just before dawn, he finds the king-to-be standing at the window with its view of the Royal Forest.  
  
Some years back - when Jon was still a squire, with Roger still just the prince’s favoured cousin - Roald confided to him that he found the view calming, knowing the endless sea of tree canopy had endured centuries of kings before him and would protect the palace’s rear walls for centuries more to come. Roger had looked and seen perfect cover for an invading army, should anyone be foolish enough to mount an all-out attack of Corus itself. At the time he’d made a mental note to rectify the error of his predecessors once he was king by cutting back the trees that now sat snugly against the palace boundary.  
  
Not, of course, that he’d voiced his plans to Roald. Sometimes he wonders what would’ve changed if he had. Probably the old fool would’ve simply tried to talk him out of regicide while his family died mysterious deaths around him.  
  
The thought of the might-have-been, of chances lost but for one girl, sets Roger’s teeth on edge even now. Instead he looks at Jonathan, seeing the tense lines of his shoulders and the white knuckles where his hands clasp behind his back. Seems like the son finds the view less soothing than this father did, although perhaps it’s more the company currently present. Roger doesn’t need the Gift of foresight to know he’s not here for Jonathan’s pleasure.  
  
Not that he ever is, anymore.  
  
“I was going to have it cut down you know,” he offers when another minute of Jonathan’s silence wakes his irritation from its early-morning daze (he sleeps lightly these days, waking every hour). “When I- well. If all went to plan.”  
  
Jon half-turns, confusion overlaying his pale, set expression. Roger gestures to the forest view to distract his cousin from catching the sudden anxiety he feels at that look; Jon looks at him with nothing but suspicion and contempt these days but this, this simmering anger clouding blue eyes with heat, is new. Roger isn’t afraid, not anymore, because there’s nothing worth fearing but death and death is now a sweet promise he holds close at night while Thom burns restlessly beside him. Nothing left to be afraid of, only anxiety that his plans may fail before he can take them all with him to that cold, cold dark.  
  
It may not be so lonely, with a kingdom’s worth of dead beside him.  
  
“All of it?” Jon’s question recalls him to himself, for now. With a shake of his head Roger crosses the room uninvited to stand at his cousin’s side. From Jon’s slight shift away, it’s not an invitation that would’ve been offered.  
  
“No your Majesty-“  
  
“Stop.” The hiss of breath is cut off abruptly as Jon controls himself. He’s doubled his self-discipline since the deaths of his parents and dimly, in the part of him that was never quite lost in the dark, Roger feels a spark of pride; he would’ve killed his cousin in a heartbeat but nevertheless would miss his strength, the sapphire eyes that flicker toward him with impatience softening the hard anger. “Stop calling me that.”  
  
“Calling you...” Rarely is Roger confused these days and he savours the half-forgotten feeling, familiar and warm from the days when Jon was a boy and could throw him with some arbitrary question. Still, it does him no good to let his guard down as he would with the child who had all this man’s innate nobility but nothing like his granite core of strength, so he’s careful in his tone once he sees Jon’s point, softly neutral: “I hardly expected I would be welcome in calling you Jonathan.”  
  
It’s answered with another shift, Jon moving to widen the gap between them to a comfortable distance and now Roger’s wondering if he’d been hasty, putting Jonathan’s aversion to touching him down to the mere dislike of his unnatural state of life. So many people showed open fear of him since his return that he hadn’t thought anything of it; now he reminds himself that Jon’s more than part sorcerer himself, and not in the least superstitious. He’d been careless to discount past history-  
  
“You wouldn’t.” Once again Jonathan interrupts his thoughts after a too-long silence. There’s something more taking place here than Roger was expecting, even with the early morning summons that couldn’t possibly bode well. Only half of Jon’s attention is on the conversation, that much is clear.  
  
“I don’t-” A rare stumble from Jon before he corrects himself. “It’s the way you say it.” For the first time since Roger’s arrival he looks at him with something other than snatched glances, locking eyes like a challenge. “You make it sound like an insult.”  
  
Roger returns the stare guilelessly, letting it last a moment past comfortable before he glances back to the window to mask his triumph. He caught the faint flush of colour to his Jon’s cheeks and both of them know it. “I had no intention of causing you distress, my cousin.”  
  
Jon makes a disgusted sound. “Don’t crawl Roger. It doesn’t become you.”  
  
This time, Roger allows his smile to show. From the corner of his eye he sees Jon’s lips twitch automatically, years of habit overriding recent memory. Things could’ve been different between them, if it had stayed like this. _If I hadn’t-_  
  
The smile snaps off like an extinguished candle flame. If there’s anything he despises more than weakness, it’s nostalgia.  
  
“I didn’t intend to cut down the entire Royal Forest,” he continues, as if Jonathan hadn’t spoken. Leaving off the ‘your Majesty’ is easy; it never came naturally to his lips. “Just a strip, maybe fifty paces wide. If an army chose to attack the forest covers them perfectly right up until they hit the walls with their ladders, and you’ll never get a clear picture of their numbers.”  
  
“This is of course, assuming an army bothers to attack and doesn’t adopt your more subtle approach.” Jonathan’s tone isn’t snide, simply contemplative. His face as he stares at the forest traced with gold from the sunrise is impassive but Roger’s known him too long not to catch the tilt of an eyebrow, the slightly narrowed eyes that mean Jon is considering a tactical problem. It’s enough that he lets the dig go with a slight shrug.  
  
“Considering that’s been proven ineffective, it’s likely they’d try a different strategy.”  
  
Jonathan’s too deep in thought to acknowledge that, intently studying the layout of the palace walls. “More visible works both ways,” he says abruptly. “Any sortie we made from the walls would be spotted immediately. We’d have to go the long way around to harry them. Clearing that much forest... it’s an expensive undertaking considering the downsides.  
  
Carefully, Roger leans down to rest his arms on the window ledge, ostensibly for a better view. It’s been a while since he’s sidetracked his cousin so thoroughly but he’s not going to waste the advantage it gives him; it’s unlikely but _possible_ that he’ll make it back to his rooms without Jonathan remembering his original plan for this meeting. Self-control second nature by now, so none of his inner tension colours his voice.  
  
“Open space means the difference between the sentries shouting a warning and them going down with their throats cut as enemies pour over your walls. It’s the difference between your sorcerers picking enemy mages off one by one and setting the entire forest on fire.”  
  
“Yes but-“ Face alight with interest now Jon leans over the sill beside him with his arm pressed to Roger’s, the mortal warmth barely noticeable after his contact with Thom. “They’d camp within the forest and we’d be forced to patrol the entire area, from the stables to there, see?” He leans out to indicate the western corner.  
  
In his enthusiasm he leans too far. They both feel the moment his balance shifts more out than in, the split second of precariousness when his boots touch too lightly to the stone floor for comfort. Already anticipating Roger’s hand is on his cousin’s back, tangled in his shirt-  
  
\- drawing him back to safety. The instant he recovers his balance, Jon jerks himself roughly free of the hold.  
  
They stand facing each other, Jon’s breath coming a little fast. Roger smiles, slightly. They both know he could’ve taken the throne right then and with the kingdom in its current state of unrest, no one would fight too hard against the new King Roger. Even Sir Raoul, even Myles of Olau wouldn’t risk civil war to avenge Jonathan’s death.  
  
Probably. Roger learnt the hard way not to underestimate Jonathan’s allies.  
  
“I’m sure you didn’t call me here to discuss palace fortifications, Jonathan,” he says softly, using the name deliberately to bring a flash of anger over Jon’s frown. “I do have work to be returning to.”  
  
“Yes,” Jonathan murmurs. His eyes on Roger’s are as intent as they were on the forest a moment before though his face is still pale, once again the soon-to-be-king rather than the eager student. He looks at Roger as if the Duke is a problem he can solve, as though thought alone could reconcile the traitor who planned to kill him with the smiling man who discusses theoretical strategy.  
  
Once, Roger might’ve flinched; now he merely lifts an eyebrow in query. “Was there something-?”  
  
With a shake of his head – not denial, rather to break himself from contemplating his cousin – Jonathan turns sharply on his heel to cross to the desk, stacked high with papers. All trace of his previous ease has vanished, replaced with stiff, precise movement as he snatches a scroll from the top of one haphazard pile and turns, holding it out in unspoken command.  
  
Roger remains leaning on the window ledge, all casual boredom. Apart from the obvious – and if Jon has discovered that, Roger would fully expect to find himself in chains when he woke rather than summoned to a private chat – there’s only one aspect of his behaviour that might merit such a reaction and it’s not something he’ll trail after Jonathan like a pet dog to defend. “What’s that?”  
  
“This,” Jon says with venom, spitting the words out like a bad taste, “is a report from the guards detailing some of your _work_ for Lord Thom. It’s supported by a verbal report I had from the chambermaids this morning. Would you care to explain?”  
  
With an exaggerated sigh, Roger lifts one shoulder in dismissal. “I hardly think this is a matter to be concerning yourself with Jonathan.” Keeping his half-smile in place he lets his gaze slip appraisingly from Jon’s face downward, flicking up to catch the reaction as he murmurs, “Unless, of course, you’d like to finish what we once started-”  
  
_“Shut up Roger.”_  
  
Roger shuts up, despite a twist of fury at the snapped order. Once Jon wouldn’t dare speak to him so; once, the anger darkening the blue eyes would’ve been born of jealousy. Knowing that laces his tone with frost. “I apologise if my assumptions caused offence _your Majesty.”_  
  
“How long?!” Fury to mirror Roger’s own thickens Jon’s voice, rising in volume. “How long have you been his _toy_. Or how long has he been yours?!”  
  
“Your Majesty?” The shout brings a knock on the door from the guard. “Is everything all right?”  
  
Sickly pale now, dark shadows under his eyes standing out in stark contrast until he looks a decade older, Jonathan stares at Roger. He doesn’t need to voice his thoughts for Roger to read them clearly. _All I have to do is say no, tell them to arrest him and then..._  
  
“Tell them,” Roger offers on a sudden impulse, desperate. He’s been smiling for so long that his face hurts; his magical link to Thom is steel wires wrapped tight around his heart. No satisfaction in a slow death on Traitor’s Hill, no one to take with him but there’ll be- a release. A line drawn under the failure that is Roger of Conté. “Tell them I tried to throw you from the window. Tell them I’ve corrupted Thom. Tell them anything you want.” His mouth twists to a sneer at the self-pity echoing in that last. “It isn’t as though I haven’t been killed before.”  
  
“Roger-“ Jon starts and the violence is gone, replaced with faint despair. He looks as though someone’s snatched the floor from under him. “I-“  
  
“Your Majesty?” The guard opens the door, tentatively edging in; Roger suspects he’s disobeying his orders not to disturb the king-to-be. “Is everything...”  
  
Without taking his eyes from Roger’s, Jonathan swallows whatever he was about to say. Instead, quietly, he says “Everything is fine. Back to your post.”  
  
“Yes your Majesty.” The click of the door closing tells them the guard’s gone. Neither of them wants to look away from each other, to be the first to speak into the tension that hums in the air itself until it’s hard to breathe.  
  
Eventually, Jon breaks. Eyelids bruise-coloured with tiredness slide closed and he leans back on the desk. “How long?” he asks again and this time it’s simply weary.  
  
“Since before Midwinter.” No point in avoiding the question again, though the desperate want for this to end still holds him tense, waiting. “It took me some weeks to recover from All Hallows. Thom was... most attentive.”  
  
Deliberate choice of words that hit home as Jon’s lips press together tight, a long moment passing before he speaks through clenched teeth. “Is that why he brought you back? Of all the people he could’ve tried for, he brought you?” _A traitor_ he doesn’t add, doesn’t need to.  
  
Roger knows he has to be careful in his choice of words now, more careful than he’s been since his return because for this to work, for his silently-screaming wait in the darkness to be worthwhile, he needs Thom. In view of Jonathan’s obvious disgust his desperation to end this sooner than he planned is fading fast; if it means bringing down his cousin, destroying all the people he holds dear and ripping his kingdom to pieces, he can smile a little longer. For a moment at the window Jon forgot to mistrust him but equally Roger forgot his purpose, the thing he bled and died for.  
  
Noncommittally he shrugs, schooling his expression to the polite detachment that’s carried him through many tricky moments since February. “You would have to ask Lord Thom. We had little contact before my... departure, aside from that last feast. Hardly time to form an attachment worthy of necromancy.”  
  
“I don’t imagine you trying to kill his twin sister helped either.” If Jonathan believes him, it’s impossible to read from his tightly neutral tone.  
  
“No,” Roger agrees affably, because he’s spent too long appearing anything but bitter about Alanna of Trebond to ruin the charade now. “But again, you would have to ask Thom. He’s never spoken of such things to me.”  
  
Jonathan runs a hand through his hair. It’s a little too long, Roger notes, curling past the top of his ears and the strands have lost their shine since Midwinter. More than anything Jon looks like he doesn’t want to be the one with the weight of the kingdom on his shoulders. No wonder the commoners are whispering of curses.  
  
_It’s all right my cousin,_ Roger thinks soothingly. _You won’t have to bear the weight of the crown long and I’ll be there to hold your hand in death._  
  
“You know.” Jonathan’s voice is very soft, on the edge of audible as if he’s not sure if he can form the words. “I could order you to stop.”  
  
_Which would merely force us to find more secret places for ourselves and you know it_. “You could your Majesty,” Roger agrees without a flicker of expression. Jon looks at him searchingly for a long, long minute but he doesn’t flinch.  
  
With a hiss of disgust Jon pushes himself from the desk, almost violent in his movement and stalks back to the window to stare at the forest once more. “Do whatever you like Roger.” Spat, almost savagely, “I don’t know why I expected anything more of you.”  
  
Choosing to obey the implicit dismissal rather than speak, Roger bows slightly before he turns to the door. Jon’s voice freezes him a step from escape.  
  
“Roger?”  
  
Pausing, the Duke of Conté glances back. Jonathan is a silhouette against the rising sun. Unreadable. “Jon?”  
  
“She’s back. Alanna. She rides to the palace later today.” Something like triumph in the words that cut Roger as sure as the sword that killed him, though Jonathan doesn’t so much as glance in his direction. “Tread carefully.”  
  
For the first time since he was summoned from his bed to this meeting, perhaps for the first time since his resurrection, Roger feels a thrill of genuine fear run through him like ice. He savours it; fear feels like living again, when he’s been dead for so long.  
  
“You should know better Jonathan,” he says silkily, seeing the king-to-be’s hands clench at his sides. “I always do.”  
  
Still smiling he leaves Jonathan standing in the sunrise as he slips past the guard towards his rooms, holding close the shiver of fear like a promise for the day to come. If he’s lucky, he’ll make it back to bed before Thom wakes.


End file.
